Examples of late bloomers that made Olympics/WC

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late comer

1 year ago 01/14/2019 7:34am CST

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I came relatively late to running (end of high school), and have showed some talent and continued to progress, not rapidly but steady enough. I'm now nearing my midtwenties, and I still feel like I'm improving and have hopes of making a World Championship/Olympic team. I've run 3:43 for 1500, 1:48 for 800. My country isn't overly competitive, so making the qualifying times should get me on the team (usually 3:36/1:46).

I'm not asking if anyone thinks I can make it, but I'm asking for examples of athletes that bloomed late to make their first team in their late 20s. I do not want athletes that were close for years before making a team (say, Katie Mackey), but athletes that as a result of progressing every year eventually put themselves in the discussion. I also don't care for the likes of Nick Willis or Mo Farah or Des Linden who were always good and saw rapid improvements later on in their 30s, or athletes like Jenny Simpson that have been consistently good for a long time. I'm after people of a similar level to me that just kept on persisting, and showed that a gradual progression of 1-2 seconds for several years is possible until they were at the level of being internationally competitive. I'm sure there are plenty out there, but some inspiration on who they are and their stories would be nice to see that my goals are possible.

Regards,
2024 Olympian
A few examples I know

1 year ago 01/14/2019 7:47am CST
re: late comer

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I know Noah Ngeny (2000 olympic 1500m winner, 2nd fastest mile of all time, world record holder for 1000m) didn't start running until after high school. There have been other Kenyan runners(just can't think of right off of the top of my head) who didn't start running till later on. Jack Foster(new Zealand runner who held the master record for the marathon back in the 70s) didn't start running until his early 30s. Bill Rodgers, although he ran college. He did quit for a few years after college. Than started running again to become one of the greatest US marathon runners. Mark Nenow did not start running until his senior year of high school. Just did wrestling till than. Just in that year he ran a sub 4:20 mile, close to 9 minutes for two miles and won the Minnesota state championship for xc. He went on to become the American record holder for 10000m and still holds the US road 10k record.
joalturn

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1 year ago 01/14/2019 8:06am CST
re: late comer

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Abdi didn’t start running until college, but he did play soccer for a while.
Letsrun is not the cool

1 year ago 01/14/2019 10:30am CST
re: late comer

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Kimetto had the marathon WR even though he didnt start training professionally until he was 26...
Not sure whether he ever made the olympics though 🤔
Not Kenyan

1 year ago 01/15/2019 5:25am CST
re: Letsrun is not the cool

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Letsrun is not the cool wrote:

Kimetto had the marathon WR even though he didnt start training professionally until he was 26...
Not sure whether he ever made the olympics though 🤔

All good and well, but I'm realistic that I'm probably not going to break the marathon world record, and these "random" (Yes, I know Kimetto, but you know what I mean), Kenyans that pop up aren't exactly relateable to me.

Similarly, other world beaters are great but I'm more curious about guys that hit 1:45, or 3:34 in their late 20s for the first time. Guys that I can more realistically aspire to be like
maybe late for dinner

1 year ago 01/15/2019 6:56am CST
re: A few examples I know

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A few examples I know wrote:

I know Noah Ngeny (2000 olympic 1500m winner, 2nd fastest mile of all time, world record holder for 1000m) didn't start running until after high school. There have been other Kenyan runners(just can't think of right off of the top of my head) who didn't start running till later on. Jack Foster(new Zealand runner who held the master record for the marathon back in the 70s) didn't start running until his early 30s. Bill Rodgers, although he ran college. He did quit for a few years after college. Than started running again to become one of the greatest US marathon runners. Mark Nenow did not start running until his senior year of high school. Just did wrestling till than. Just in that year he ran a sub 4:20 mile, close to 9 minutes for two miles and won the Minnesota state championship for xc. He went on to become the American record holder for 10000m and still holds the US road 10k record.

You really call a guy who starts after high school and runs the second fastest mile ever a year or so later a "late bloomer"?

Putting the Bouts to them

1 year ago 01/15/2019 6:57am CST
re: maybe late for dinner

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The best example is Hamou Boutayeb. He started running in his early thirties and just a couple of years later made a WR attempt and then caused all kinds of problems in the Olympic final.
Villanova alum

1 year ago 01/15/2019 7:22am CST
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late comer wrote:
I'm asking for examples of athletes that bloomed late to make their first team in their late 20s.

Dick Burkle, former indoor mile world record holder (1978) and two-time US Olympic Team member (1976 and 1980), only ran a 4:28 mile in high school. He was 29 in 1976. (By junior year at Villanova he had improved to 8:46 in the 2-mile, so maybe he doesn't qualify as a "late bloomer"?)
thinking back to 1984

1 year ago 01/15/2019 8:04am CST
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Pfitzinger was solid but unspectacular before winning the trials. Ruth Wysocki, same story.
The Bostonian

1 year ago 01/15/2019 9:57am CST
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Bill Rogers

/EOT/
latebloomer

1 year ago 01/15/2019 11:50am CST
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Guys like Nick Symonds and CLayton Murphy took a bit more time to develop, they were good but not quite great in high school. Then in college they got really good.
Precious Roy

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1 year ago 01/15/2019 12:01pm CST
re: latebloomer

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Jaouad Gharib had no interest in distance running until he was 20. His first international competition was when he was 29. He was 36 when he famously dueled with Sammy Wanjiru at the 2008 Olympic Marathon.

Just Another LRC Idiot

1 year ago 01/15/2019 12:31pm CST
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latebloomer wrote:

Guys like Nick Symonds and CLayton Murphy took a bit more time to develop, they were good but not quite great in high school. Then in college they got really good.

Murphy was an Olympic medalist at age 21. A late bloomer? LOL!
glegswest

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1 year ago 01/15/2019 9:18pm CST
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Krista Duchene
Examplea

1 year ago 01/15/2019 11:29pm CST
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Look up Kerri Gallagher - ran at Fordham, by no means great, don’t think she was ever close to AA.
A couple of years post college, made the WC team for 1500, in 2015 I believe. I think advanced one or two rounds at worlds.
She got sick or injured or something so 2016 was a bust unfortunately. Not sure if she still trains.
YMMV

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1 year ago 01/15/2019 11:40pm CST
re: Examplea

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Sara Vaughn spent most of her 20s just trying to make finals, and finally made a WC team in '17 at age 31.
Cavorty

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1 year ago 01/15/2019 11:41pm CST
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Paul Evans - was a soccer player until the age of 25. He made the Barcelona Olympic 10000m final, had a best of 27:47.79, , also ran a 1:01:55 half and a 2:08.52 marathon to win in Chicago in 1996 at the age of 35.

Steve Jones didn't start seriously until he was in the RAF and about 20.
It's not that simple

1 year ago 01/16/2019 1:10am CST
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You are asking about two very different features of a runner's career. First, you want someone who is a late bloomer, who runs PBs later in life. Second, you want someone who improves incrementally, but steadily. As you put it, you want "a gradual progression of 1-2 seconds for several years."

As people have pointed out, there are plenty of examples of late bloomers. It's harder to find examples of runners who improve gradually and steadily. Most runners are like Gallagher and Vaughn, who were both stuck and then dropped big (4/5 second) PBs. Those who don't have big jumps in their PBs tend to be inconsistent, with season's bests that jump around quite a bit. For the 1500, two examples are Ben Blankenship and Garrett Heath. Both took 5+ years to go from 3:40 to 3:34, and neither dropped their PB by more than 2 1/2 seconds. But neither ran consistently faster every year.

(You can look at their progressions on their IAAF Athlete Profile pages, which have a tab showing progressions by event. It makes for fascinating reading.)
cotton shirt

1 year ago 01/16/2019 1:43am CST
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latecomer asked: I'm asking for examples of athletes that bloomed late to make their first team in their late 20s.

I don't have data on "making their first team," but I do have data on medalists.

the average age at which male athletes earn their FIRST medal in international tournaments is in their mid to late twenties. the precise figures are shown in the following table:

average age at first medal - men
event / mean / values
400m 23.44 (n = 177, sd = 1.84)
800m 23.78 (n = 166, sd = 2.33)
1500m 24.42 (n = 153, sd = 2.23)
5000m 25.01 (n = 116, sd = 2.73)
10,000m 25.83 (n = 145, sd = 3.02)

this table says that of 153 medalists surveyed at the 1500m, their average age at first medal was 24.42 years, and the standard deviation was 2.23 years, which means that the "normal" range is 22.19 - 26.65 years.

the oldest medalist at each of the middle distance events is as follows:
400m Mark Kiprotich Mutai (KEN) 32 years, 200 days
800m Osmar Barbosa dos Santos (BRA) 35 years, 138 days
1500m Mike Boit (KEN) 33 years, 276 days
3000m Bernard Lagat (USA) 35 years, 92 days
5000m Miruts Yifter (ETH) 36 years, 78 days
10,000m Dieter Baumann (GER) 37 years, 179 days

examples of athletes who won their first medal at greater than average age:
(note: I have excluded sub-saharan Africans, so that you have something to "relate" to)
800m - age limit 25 years
fname / sname / code / age
Johnny Gray USA 32.1288
Albert Hill ENG 31.4000
Erik Byléhn SWE 30.5425
Roger Moens BEL 30.3534
Nick Symmonds USA 29.6192
Marcel Hansenne FRA 29.5808
Noel Clough AUS 29.2877
Willi Wülbeck FRG 28.6411
Arthur Wint JAM 28.1890
Rick Wohlhuter USA 27.5863
Frank Handley ENG 27.2849
Paul Schmidt FRG 27.0329
Rich Kenah USA 27.0110
Philip Edwards BGU 26.8822
Tony Blue AUS 26.8082
Rune Gustafsson SWE 26.7288
Heinz Ulzheimer FRG 26.5671
Bram Som NED 26.4767
Piotr Piekarski POL 26.3863
Ben Cayenne TRI 26.3425
Alfred Tysoe ENG 26.3205
Jorma Harkonen FIN 26.3123
José Luíz Barbosa BRA 26.2658
Hans-Peter Ferner FRG 26.2575
Tomás de Teresa ESP 25.9397
Bevil Rudd RSA 25.8658
Gary Reed CAN 25.8548
Luciano Sušanj YUG 25.8164
Earl Eby USA 25.7452
Achraf Tadili CAN 25.7041
Alberto Juantorena CUB 25.6411
Audun Boysen NOR 25.3014
Seymour Newman JAM 25.2384
David Hall USA 25.2082
Hermann Engelhard GER 25.1096
Lukáš Vydra CZE 25.0000

1500m - age limit 25 years
fname / sname / code / age
Driss Maazouzi FRA 31.8247
István Rózsavölgyi HUN 31.4384
Johan Cronje RSA 31.3479
Philip Noel-Baker ENG 30.7973
José Luis González ESP 29.7452
Carsten Schlangen GER 29.5781
Charles Bennett ENG 29.5452
Mahiédine Mekhissi-Benabbad FRA 29.4247
Mário Silva POR 29.1096
Eino Purje FIN 28.4493
Peter O'Donoghue NZL 28.3425
John Whetton ENG 28.0384
Juan Carlos Higuero ESP 28.0164
Leonel Manzano USA 27.9014
Arturo Casado ESP 27.5068
Jim Spivey USA 27.5014
Francesco Arese ITA 27.3397
Steve Scott USA 27.2767
Terence Sullivan RHO 27.2329
Manuel Olmedo ESP 27.2027
Branko Zorko CRO 27.1068
Han Kulker NED 27.0438
William Whyte AUS 27.0192
Glenn Cunningham USA 27.0055
Anthony Whiteman ENG 26.8548
Jürgen Straub GDR 26.7425
Adil Kaouch MAR 26.6055
Henry Eriksson SWE 26.5863
Tom Birger Hansen DEN 26.5342
Gunnar Nielsen DEN 26.4301
Youssef Saad Kamel BRN 26.3918
Erik Jørgensen DEN 26.3452
Alan Simpson ENG 26.2274
Alan Simpson ENG 26.2274
Joseph Mostert BEL 26.1123
Josef Odložil TCH 25.9425
David Campbell CAN 25.9205
Eamonn Coghlan IRL 25.7836
Miklós Szabó (1908) HUN 25.7534
Henri Deloge FRA 25.6466
Dan Waern SWE 25.6000
Lawrence Shields USA 25.4575
Hauke Fuhlbrügge GER 25.4493
William Nankeville ENG 25.4274
Abdelaati Iguider MAR 25.3699
David Moorcroft ENG 25.3397
Henryk Szordykowski POL 25.2986
Josy Barthel LUX 25.2548
Jens-Peter Herold GER 25.2493
Lennart Strand SWE 25.2000
Gerald Backhouse AUS 25.1863
Rashid Ramzi BRN 25.0658

cheers
ukathleticscoach

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1 year ago 01/16/2019 6:24am CST
re: late comer

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Trained with this guy he was always good but ran 1:45 mid twenties and made world champs team. He'd done more 1500's and longer distance when younger

Never saw anyone finish ahead of him on any rep!

https://www.thepowerof10.info/athletes/profile.aspx?athleteid=949